#basiliska

Iris is meticulously clean.

It’s a little strange, to compare her now, between now and then, rank and covered in filth. Even though she needed it to survive, the prison guards were wary of giving her water. They’d heard she could freeze it into a weapon and stab them, or force it into their mouths and noses and drown them in hardly more than a bucket’s worth; when the rain came down through the grate at the top of her cell she would collect what fell with her magic and then freeze it over in a corner. They found her disturbingly quiet, and they claimed that her being thrummed with some kind of invasive, unseen power that prodded into their minds, into the stuff of their very souls.

She’s obviously changed. Not just the blindfold, but her bearing as well—sharper, harder, like her silhouette, in stark relief. She’s bonier, and hasn’t quite gained back her original weight yet. Anneliese notices scars in places that she’d rather not think about, and her aura at once demands one’s attention and discourages it. Something’s changed, but no matter how she tries to fashion it into words, she fails to reach the heart of it. Something inside her is broken, for which there is no easy fix.

Anneliese buys a petrification amulet before Iris is scheduled for release from prison. She buys it from the most legitimate and reliable source she can find—through a colleague of Antonia Lerchenfeld’s—and keeps it in the most secure space she can find in the estate. She decides that even if it doesn’t work, she wouldn’t mind being petrified by her lover. There is something tragically romantic about that.

There are strange, thin scars on Iris’s face, around her eyes and where the metal band clamped around her head. Iris will tell her that she worked the shackle off with water and a bit of magic; it hardly mattered, as she was rarely allowed contact with anyone. It does not explain the thinner white scars, that looks like scratches, around her eyelids. They remind her of an animal, trying to gnaw off its own leg in desperation.

Anneliese survives making eye contact with Iris for the first time since she was cursed. Her eyes look no different than they did before. Her expression hasn’t changed much either, for better or worse. Iris is resilient—she’ll give her that. She is noticeably mute for the first few days since her release from prison, but she soon begins to talk. She is incensed, which is nothing unusual for her. But she is also despairing, which is new in the worst possible way. Anneliese weathers her mood swings with as much equanimity as she can muster, but they’re worse than they ever were.

Iris has changed, but she has not lost herself, and the possibility of that, however distant, is what frightens her the most.

Once Iris is able to walk, they go to the beach, where she wades into the water. She is a good swimmer—Anneliese has seen her swim once or twice—and her motions are completely effortless. Rather than moving the water, the water seems to part around her. She has a predilection toward sailing, seafood, coastal towns and anything that reminds her of the sea, argues that like any good sailor it’s normal to love it as much as one fears it, and truthfully, Anneliese sees it as no different than any other human obsession; she herself has a fixation on wealth and power and control and attention, and shamelessness, no less, and compared to all of those the sea seems much less likely to drive Iris to personal ruin.

Sometimes, when they are together, she feels as though she is adrift in an endless ocean. It’s soothing, in a way, though she can’t quite articulate why.

Iris moves back into her apartment briefly, giving Anneliese an excuse to be with her. June is mild and rainy, and so the warmth of her body is pleasant rather than overbearing; Anneliese curls into her side, and feels whole for the first time in months. She’s always been bony, but there’s an easy grace, a fluidity in her movements that seems even more pronounced given that she spends most of her days now completely sightless. When her strength returns, Anneliese feels it—and the source of it has to be that something that she can’t quite put her finger on, some kind of weird psychic glamour, some overwhelming force that seeps into her bones and stays there.

It’s called ethersense. According to Iris, this is the method by which she navigates the world without her sight. It requires constant use of magic, rendering her rather more helpless in places where the Ether is thin, but in most places where life is abundant, it serves her to the point where it can replace her sight and more. She compares her new abilities to something like a spiritual awakening, and Anneliese can’t decide whether that pleases or disturbs her. If it helps her, then so be it, but that being said there is something uncanny about being able to pluck the ley lines of the Ether at will, to navigate the world by its magical density, by the collective emotions and experiences of those who once lived there. Iris has admitted that this substitute vision is imperfect and does not always accurately reflect the world as others see it—but then again, whose does?

She insists that the use of it harms no one but herself.

She’s probably right.

Anneliese asks one day whether she has become smarter, wiser, more mature as a result of it, and Iris denies that it has done anything other than serve a practical purpose at a relatively low cost. She freely admits to being more mentally unsound as a result of her imprisonment, and the political circumstances surrounding her curse, and the stress of having to live with a condition that could so easily harm other people; she expects it, does not allow it to stop her from living her life. She is quiet and frightening and intense, sometimes unpleasant, but always considerate and empathetic. She is alternately more kind and more violent than she has ever been, and Anneliese does not know what to make of it. Iris tells her that she is losing her mind. She doesn’t doubt that.

Anneliese feels as if she is watching her fall apart from a distance, and she is disturbed that the feeling does not concern her more. Perhaps it’s because she can do nothing more than observe.

“Do I fascinate you?” Iris asks one evening by candlelight, hostile and brusque.

“You always did.”

“I can’t,” she says, slumped at the table. “I’m tired of the attention. The powers, being special. It’s never done me any good, and I’ve the feeling it never will.”

“What can you do, cariño? We can’t change who we are.”

“That’s magic.” Iris eyes her in the dark. “Magic is capable of anything, except changing human nature, evidently. But it could at least make us into better versions of ourselves.”

“That’s not magic,” says Anneliese.

“Then what is it?”

“Human resilience. Don’t call it magic when it’s something that everyone is capable of doing.”

“I’m tired,” she says again, stiffly.

She doesn’t know how to respond.

“I don’t know what I’m doing anymore.”

“Give it more time. You don’t have to decide right away.”

“Do you think I was born… to be extraordinary? To be destined for greatness?”

“You were born into magical power. That makes you no different from anyone else born into privilege. What you do with that power matters more than any predetermined fate,” Anneliese drawls. She feels disengaged, like she can’t understand any of what Iris is saying, or for that matter what she’s saying.

“What if I want to do nothing?”

“That’s fair.”

Iris is quiet. “Strange,” she says, then, “to hear that coming from you.”

“You’re tired. It happens. Everyone deserves a break, every once in a while. Some need longer than others.” She isn’t sure where the advice is coming from, whether she heard it from somewhere else, or whether she’s making it all up. Maybe Iris even told her this once. “If you’re feeling overwhelmed, then you shouldn’t push yourself harder. You wouldn’t strain your heart, so why would you strain your mind?”

“I can’t do nothing.”

“That isn’t my problem.”

“You don’t seem very invested in this.”

“You don’t sound very upset.”

“I’m not. I don’t feel… anything.”

She’s right. The passion of their relationship from weeks earlier—the euphoria of Iris’s release from prison, finally—has faded. There’s an uncertainty, and with that, a sense of ennui. A sense that nothing matters anymore. That it’s all downhill from here.

“I can’t help you with that.”

“Good for nothing,” she clucks, and Anneliese gleans affection and exhaustion in her voice.

It’s all downhill from here, and no amount of sex or pretty words, luxuriant purchases or long walks on the beach will compensate for that. Their relationship has hit a dead end.

Iris looks at her. “Do you think they’re still out for me? The Coffers?”

“I can only imagine they didn’t react too well upon hearing of your release. Though they aren’t the sort to resort to murder, given that. You never seemed that concerned, so I never brought it up—”

“I’m not,” she sighs. “I-I don’t know. What can they do? Beat a dead horse? I don’t c…”

Anneliese glares at her. “Don’t say it. Preserve yourself, at the very least. I didn’t put in all that effort to watch you die.”

“So I’m a wasted effort then,” she says, tone acrid.

“You know what I meant.”

“What do you want me to tell you? That I’ll be able to subsist off of your love and generosity forever? I need… That isn’t what I need. I need more than that.”

“Then find it.”

“Anne…”

“What?” She sounds bitter to herself. “I know what you want to do. Don’t hesitate. If that is really what’s best for you, then you ought to do it. What I want shouldn’t matter. Your happiness comes before all of that. And I know you aren’t happy here.”

“You’re upset,” she says meekly.

“I’ll be fine.” She is upset. “You should go. You have no reason to be concerned for me. I have…” she looks away, “plenty to keep myself occupied with.”

“All right.” She’s surprisingly compliant, given her tone from earlier. “If you insist.”

Anneliese looks at her. “You do want to leave?”

“For a change. I don’t see the harm in it. It’s certainly a better prospect than staying here. But you won’t be the same without me.” There’s a note of condescension in her voice, and it stings. “Not when you have nothing left to fight for.”

She’s right, Anneliese wants to say, but pride stops her from admitting it. Iris is worried that she’ll forget—that none of this will matter if she leaves. That all of her efforts will have been wasted on a woman who would be quick to throw away her memories of her for something, or someone, new. That because she no longer has a stake in what happens, she will no longer waste effort trying to realize their vision for the future. Out of sight, out of mind.

She wants to reassure her, but oddly, she can’t think of anything.

She settles for being honest. “You know where I am,” she says. “If you’re so concerned, then tell me. Though we may be apart, that doesn’t mean we have to forget about one another.”

“Not you,” she says. “Me. Without me—I…” She looks down. “What does it mean if I’m not there. If you succeed and I did nothing to accomplish it.”

“You won’t be gone forever,” Anneliese says, plainly. “You need more time. Maybe you can find a cure, or someone, or something new that can help us. Don’t give up yet.”

“Right.” Iris stands, wearily. “Do what you think is best.”

“Iris?”

“I have no control over what happens once I leave. You’re the one who will be here—who will have to deal with them. Regardless of what you do, I won’t be able to intervene. Does it make a difference whether I contact you or not?”

She frowns. “Of course it does. I…”

“You will do whatever it is you had intended to do, regardless of my input. I won’t always know what you mean to do, and so my advice might come too late, or it may not have been of any use to you in the first place. If you would have me do something, then perhaps I shall. But I can’t have you do anything so long as I’m not there. That is what I meant. Your have your freedom.” She grips the edge of the table. “So use it well.”

Once Iris has her mind set on leaving, she begins to distance herself from Anneliese, from their relationship. Fair enough, she thinks.